Gov. Gretchen Whitmer correctly noted in her State of the State address that “COVID exposed deep inequities in our education system.” Yet her latest K-12
Good morning, it’s Wednesday, March 10, 2021. Seventy years ago today, J. Edgar Hoover revealed that he had taken himself out of the running to become the third commissioner of Major League Baseball.
Whether the job was formally offered to Hoover is unclear, but his name was definitely among 18 floated publicly for the job, and the New York Times reported that support for Hoover among the owners was strong. It seems a strange pairing to me. It’s true that Hoover was a true baseball fan and a popular figure in post-war America. But the FBI director was also an authoritarian, and the owners were seeking to replace Happy Chandler because they found him meddlesome. They wouldn’t have appreciated Hoover’s habit of conducting oppo research on his bosses, with the attendant possibility of blackmail.
Ben DeGrow, Mackinac Center for Public Policy
In recent weeks, more school districts have come around to provide in-person instruction again. But those that have kept classroom doors closed until now cannot blame shortfalls in federal aid for the delay.
As Bridge Magazine reported last week, a few large school districts, including Ann Arbor and Kalamazoo, have failed to even issue a plan for face-to-face instruction to return. This, even with the known educational and emotional harms of limiting children’s social interactions, the months of evidence that schools aren’t super-spreaders and multiple indicators that show the virus is receding across Michigan. These three districts are among about 15% of those statewide that have offered nothing but remote education since the pandemic started last March.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer correctly noted in her State of the State address that “COVID exposed deep inequities in our education system.” Yet her latest K-12 fu
Mackinac Center for Public Policy
The end of November marked the 45th anniversary of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act going into effect. The federal law enshrined the idea that every child with a disability is entitled to a meaningful education that is as inclusive as possible. Even though time has changed many perceptions of what students with disabilities can achieve, many people have been dissatisfied with the progress we’ve made in fulfilling the vision.
This year’s experiences with pandemic learning have only mounted the frustrations.
The sudden onset of COVID-19, with its many unknowns, challenged schools’ ability to help students with special learning challenges. Many people, including the Onyx family in Oakland County, have pleaded for face-to-face educational opportunities, calling them indispensable. Both of their children need consistent access to aides and therapies that were suddenly denied to them when school buildings closed in the spring.